Politico: “For the first time since we began tracking this question last spring, a majority of Iowa GOP insiders say Cruz, the conservative Texas senator, would be the top vote-getter if the state’s caucuses were held today.”
Archives for December 2015
Trump Opens a Third Lane
Wall Street Journal: “Past nominating contests have often boiled down to two-person races in which an establishment-backed front-runner beats a socially conservative candidate who appeals to working-class voters—a role Rick Santorum filled in 2012, as did Mike Huckabee in 2008 and Pat Buchanan in 1996.”
“Now, Mr. Trump appears to be opening a new, third lane in the GOP, drawing on a large share of voters who don’t have a college degree and don’t identify strongly with the party’s touchstone social issues, such as opposition to abortion rights and gay marriage.”
“That raises the prospect that the 2016 contest could narrow to a three-person race featuring the leading choice of social conservatives, the top pick of the party’s establishment wing of centrists and business-friendly Republicans—and Mr. Trump.”
GOP Rivals Unite Against Obama on Islamic State
“The Republican candidates for president angrily demanded on Friday that the United States face up to a new world war, one that has breached its borders, threatened the safety of Americans and brought the menace of Islamic terrorism deep into the homeland,” the New York Times reports.
“With striking unanimity, they accused President Obama and his fellow Democrats of shrinking from a long-overdue assault on the Islamic State and its frighteningly effective tools of global recruitment.”
GOP Candidates Show Off Gun Pride
Washington Post: “There was a time when politicians professed their enthusiasm for gun rights by donning camouflage and hunting pheasants. Now, Republican presidential hopefuls campaign in active shooting ranges. They invite the media to watch them fire assault rifles or demolish the tax code with an AR-15. Or, as Cruz did in August, they wrap strips of raw bacon around the barrel of a machine gun to cook them with the heat of gunfire.”
“Republican politics have hardened from gun rights to gun pride, as candidates embrace and show off the more militaristic features of weaponry.”
Why Trump’s Lead May Be Deceiving
Steven Shepard: “Donald Trump has reached a new high in the polls, sending fresh shivers through the Republican establishment’s spine, but those familiar with the nitty-gritty details of the surveys say they harbor plenty of small cracks and flaws that should give rivals hope that the real-estate tycoon isn’t yet running away with the nomination.”
Wall Street Journal: “Political outsiders have led in early polling. But if the past two presidential election cycles are any indication, those who are frontrunners before voting begins aren’t necessarily poised to win the nomination.”
For members: Are the polls exaggerating Trump’s lead?
Cruz Seeks to Push Carson Out
“Ted Cruz returns to Iowa this weekend aiming to capitalize on Ben Carson’s precipitous decline and to establish himself as the anti-Washington candidate most qualified to be commander-in-chief,” Politico reports.
“Both Cruz and Carson will court voters at the last big cattle-call scheduled in Iowa before the Feb. 1 caucuses – an event hosted by the conservative group FreedomWorks. And while the event was meant to focus on economics, the emergence of security and foreign policy is climbing to the top of the agenda, giving Cruz the edge his supporters think he needs to elbow Carson out.”
NYT Leads with Editorial on Gun Control
The New York Times ran an editorial on its front page for the first time since 1920 urging lawmakers to tighten gun control regulations.
“It is a moral outrage and a national disgrace that civilians can legally purchase weapons designed specifically to kill people with brutal speed and efficiency. These are weapons of war, barely modified and deliberately marketed as tools of macho vigilantism and even insurrection. America’s elected leaders offer prayers for gun victims and then, callously and without fear of consequence, reject the most basic restrictions on weapons of mass killing, as they did on Thursday.”
Bush Team May Launch Negative Ad Blitz
Politico: “According to another source close to Right to Rise, Murphy has been floating another tactical shift to potential supporters, suggesting that he might spend the bulk of the $75 million to carpet bomb Rubio, Cruz, Carson, Christie—everyone but Trump. The thinking: making the race into a binary choice between Bush and Trump might be the only way a majority of primary voters go with Bush.”
Uncomfortable Moments with Ted Cruz
Gawker: “Thanks to the (few) rules governing campaign Super PACs, candidates aren’t technically allowed to coordinate with them. Which means candidates can’t technically feed them hours and hours of raw video footage for future campaign ads. Candidates can however, casually leave them on a neglected YouTube account for Super PACs to find. And thank god they can, because Ted Cruz did.”
Bonus Quote of the Day
“I don’t hear anybody talking about bomb control. They put bombs and left bombs behind on the scene of attack, intending to kill even more people than they did with guns.”
— Sen. Marco Rubio, in an interview with Fox News.
Do TV Ads Still Work?
GOP political strategist Mark McKinnon to NPR: “There’s just very little return on media dollars anymore in politics, because people just don’t believe political advertising. They’re just demanding authenticity and something that they think is real, and they know that advertising is not real. So, you might as well just burn that money.”
Earlier for members: Have political television ads finally lost their effectiveness?
Why Independents Aren’t Really
Charlie Cook notes that “even most of these professed independents don’t actually behave, well, independently.”
“The American National Election Studies are a series of national surveys immediately before and after presidential elections, led by political scientists at the University of Michigan and Stanford University. In 2012, it found that 87 percent of independents who, when pushed, conceded they feel closer to the Democratic Party wound up voting for Obama. The same percentage of independents who admitted a soft spot for Republicans went for Romney. In 2008, Obama’s hope-and-change campaign drew a whopping 91 percent of Democratic-leaning independents, while McCain won 82 percent of independents who leaned Republican. Simply put, many of the people who self-identify as political independents are, for electoral purposes, partisans. They vote almost as predictably as Americans who simply label themselves as a Democrat or a Republican.”
“True independents, who don’t lean toward either party, made up only 5 percent of the 2012 electorate, according to the ANES survey.”
Trump’s Perfect Medical Report
Jimmy Kimmel got an early copy of Donald Trump’s medical report:
Trump Quote of the Day
“When you get these terrorists, you have to take out their families. They care about their lives, don’t kid yourself. But they say they don’t care about their lives. You have to take out their families.”
— Donald Trump, quoted by MSNBC, ratcheting up his rhetoric about the Islamic State.
How Rubio Turned Political Power Into Money
Washington Post: “Rubio’s business deals during the period between his Tallahassee and Washington chapters demonstrated the ways he leveraged his enduring power inside government to make a profit on the outside. And they add to the contradictory picture of his personal finances that has emerged as his presidential campaign has gained traction — of a young man who struggled financially even as his personal income soared along with this political success.”
Why Donald Trump Isn’t Like Howard Dean
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Sweet Freedom
Just published: Sweet Freedom: A Devotional by Sarah Palin.
It’s a signed, limited edition with imitation leather cover.
The Case Against Trump Winning
David Brooks: “When campaigns enter that final month, voters tend to gravitate toward the person who seems most orderly. As the primary season advances, voters’ tolerance for risk declines. They focus on the potential downsides of each contender and wonder, Could this person make things even worse?”
“When this mental shift happens, I suspect Trump will slide. All the traits that seem charming will suddenly seem risky. The voters’ hopes for transformation will give way to a fear of chaos. When the polls shift from registered voters to likely voters, cautious party loyalists will make up a greater share of those counted.”
First Read: “Brooks could be right. But here’s our question: Does today’s Republican Party look and think and sound like David Brooks? The answer could very well decide if Trump is the nominee.”
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Taegan Goddard
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire -- which for more than two decades has been one of the nation's most influential political news sites.
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